


Special Delivery

by dark_roast



Category: Marvel Avengers Movies Universe, The Avengers (2012)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-10-24
Updated: 2012-10-24
Packaged: 2017-11-16 23:54:25
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,120
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/545219
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dark_roast/pseuds/dark_roast
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Post-Avengers. When Sigyn arrives on Earth unannounced, the team comes up with a plan to stop Loki from causing further chaos and destruction by dropping Sigyn into the middle of a fight. Sigyn agrees to the plan. Everyone knows they're taking a dangerous chance, and there are numerous ways for the plan to go horribly wrong.</p><p>Only Tony and Natasha have a suspicion that the plan will go wrong in a way nobody predicted.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Special Delivery

Tony Stark has made some cataclysmically bad decisions in his life. Despite what Rhodey or Pepper or Happy might say, however — Tony always knows a bad decision before he makes it. He'll deny that. He'll laugh off his behavior as the privilege of an eccentric billionaire. But, he laughs it off because he knows most people won't understand.

Bad choices have a feverish glitter to them, like the eyes of a crazy homeless guy peering out of an alley. You can tell yourself to cross the street and keep walking, but something perverse inside of you makes you stop and stare anyhow. Even though you know you'll regret it. Especially when you know you'll regret it.

Tony's been having that fevery, sick feeling ever since last Wednesday. It's not just him, either. He can tell Natasha feels it to. The rest of the team, they're all aware the mission is risky and the chances of success are slim. Natasha's eyes say it’s gonna be a wrong one. Bad idea. Very bad idea. There's all the ways SHIELD has projected this mission could go wrong, and then there's the way it's actually going to go wrong.

Tony's headset crackles.

"Stark?" Natasha's crisp voice comes over the pickup. _Speak of the devil._

"Is it time?" Tony says.

"It's time. Deliver the package."

"Ten-four."

He strides across the roof of the bank building toward the woman standing at the edge and looking down. She doesn't look bothered by the ten story drop or the clouds of smoke billowing up from the street. She turns as Tony's heavy footsteps come crunching across the rubble.

She doesn't look Asgardian. None of the Asgardians do. They look like people. It's just that Sigyn Freyrsdöttir looks more like a person than Loki or Thor. She's enviably tall like the other Asgardians — although inside the Iron Man suit, Tony's got a couple of inches on her. But, she doesn't look like Loki's girlfriend.

Loki's _betrothed._ That's the way Thor put it. Though, apparently, Loki and Sigyn have been broken up for a while. Tony still can't get his head around that concept: knowing somebody for hundreds of years. Never mind being somebody's ex for that long.

Until last Wednesday, he'd given zero conscious thought to Loki having a romantic partner. Now he realizes he's been assuming Loki would pair up with someone as flamboyantly villainous as himself. The Evil-Lynn to his Skeletor.

Tony smiles at Sigyn. He likes her. He likes most people. He likes Loki. He likes the possibilities of a Loki who's not laying waste to cities and flinging him out of windows. He likes the Loki of Thor's stories, though he doubts that Loki ever truly existed.

But, Loki and Sigyn? He can't see it.

"You ready?" he asks Sigyn.

She squares her shoulders, and gives him a brisk nod. The acrid wind sweeping across the rooftop ruffles her short, dark curls. She's lovely, with her golden skin and her big brown eyes. All Asgardian women are lovely. He's willing to lay money on that.

"I am ready, Tony Stark," she says.

Tony lowers the faceplate of his helmet. "Hang on tight."

Sigyn wraps her arms around the suit's middle, and Tony loops one arm around her, just to be on the safe side. To try and appease the litany of _bad idea, bad idea_ , repeating in his head. It doesn't help.

He fires his retro rockets, and takes off across the smoking, shattered landscape of Century City. JARVIS feeds him telemetry on the helmet's heads-up display. But before long, he doesn't need the help. Arcs of green light explode from the roof of a cylindrical skyscraper. The swathes of ice on the roof glow golden-orange, reflecting the sunset. It's fucking March in Los Angeles, and ice is five billion kinds of wrong. The fact that it's also pretty makes it even wronger.

As Tony flies closer, he sees Steve and the Hulk have Loki pinned down on the roof. Backing Thor's brother into a corner, whether literal or figurative, is a situation best avoided in all circumstances, except for this one. Today, it's the opportunity the Avengers team has been working toward.

There's no sign of Thor, and no sign of Clint, and Tony whispers a _thank-you_ to any nonpartisan gods who might be listening.

He zooms down to the rooftop, dropping in between Loki and the Hulk. Loki's eyes narrow. He's only seeing Tony in that first moment. Only seeing the gleaming red and gold Iron Man suit, not the slender girl in the long, dark gown.

Sigyn lets go of Tony and steps away from him.

"Loki," she says.

Loki is pale already, but he goes bloodless. The emotion on his sharp-featured face is not what Tony expected to see, and it is not what Tony wants to see. He hasn't been stupid enough to hope for a happy, huggy-kissy reunion between Loki and Sigyn... okay, one _miniscule_ part of him _maybe_ pictured that happening. Once. And only after Pepper wistfully suggested it.

Mostly he's been hoping to see Loki's sneer crumple into shame and regret. He's been hoping Sigyn will catch Loki off guard long enough that the team can finally capture him.

Loki leaps back a step and raises the spear in his hands. The expression on is face is fear. The guy who trashed Manhattan with an alien army, busted out of an Asgardian prison and came back to be the unsquashable cockroach in SHIELD's salad... is terrified. Of Sigyn.

Tony finds himself wondering all of them have misjudged Sigyn. Critically, fatally misjudged her.

"You cannot be here," Loki snarls at her. "You _cannot_ be here!"

Sigyn reaches for him. Loki swings the spear to point directly at her. A viciously spiked blade of ice materializes in his other hand. Steve tenses and the Hulk growls, and Tony raises his own hands, activating his palm-cannons.

Loki's wide, horrified eyes snap to him. "What have you done?"

Tony is positive he didn't hear that right.

"The Chitauri will not stop once they have me. How can you ally with them? How can you be so _blind_?" Loki spits the last word at Tony like a mouthful of poison.

Sigyn says, "Loki, hear reason. Please."

Loki laughs at her, a harsh, brittle sound that sends a chill skittering down Tony's spine. There's darkness and madness in that laugh.

Sigyn takes a step toward him, and Loki lunges at her with the spear. Tony sees all of it in his mind's eye: the spear impaling Sigyn's body, the blood pouring out of her mouth and down her chin. It doesn't happen. Loki's lunge is no more than a feint. Sigyn retreats, and Loki doesn't pursue. He could have killed her. He didn't.

"I will not hear you," he tells her. "Not ever again. Do with me what you will; I cannot prevent you — but I am done with you."

"She's not Chitauri," Steve says. His voice carries across the rooftop; both impatient and surprisingly gentle, as if he's arguing with a recalcitrant child. Or with Tony. "We're not striking deals with the Chitauri. Lady Sigyn traveled here from Asgard."

"I've come to Midgard seeking you," Sigyn adds. "Loki, my love, please end this."

Loki bares his teeth at her. "You know my mind. You know Sigyn would never say that. And you know she would never return to me."

The Hulk slams his fist down onto the roof. Shards of concrete fly; several hit of Tony's armor with a musical _pingity-ping_. Tony jumps in surprise, and so does everyone else, including Loki. The spear sweeps up again, this time pointed at the Hulk.

"No Chitauri!" roars the Hulk. His massive hand whips toward Sigyn, missing her by less than a yard, as he points at her. "She little god. Like Thor. Like you. _Stupid,_ " he adds, glowering pointedly at Loki, so it's clear that Thor and Sigyn are only little, not stupid.

A flicker of uncertainty crosses Loki's face.

The Hulk turns to Steve. "Hulk smash?"

"No. Not yet. Thank you, though."

The Hulk grunts, and sits back on his haunches. Sigyn tries again to approach Loki, her hands held up. Loki is trembling, either with fear or with strain. Even with his heavy leather and gold armor, Tony can see him shaking. The tip of the spear wavers, then it slowly dips, as Loki glances down toward Sigyn's heart. Tony tenses. He's the closest to Sigyn, but he'll never reach her in time.

"Your necklace," Loki says.

Tony commented on Sigyn's necklace the first time he met her in New Mexico. The green gem in the center is cracked, and one of the gold petals is broken at the tip. He knows an excellent jeweler, and he offered to hook her up. Sigyn inclined her head courteously, and replied that no Midgardian craftsman could repair it.

Sigyn lifts a hand to her chest. "I broke it. I threw it to the floor when... when Thor came to tell me you were dead."

"You were not wearing it before."

"Yes, I was," she replies with a touch of annoyance. "I never take it off. Only that once, and never again."

"You were not wearing it," Loki repeats. "Not when you came to me. Not when you whispered to me —"

He drops the spear. It clatters onto the concrete. He presses the heels of both hands against his forehead, squeezing his eyes shut. In a flare of green and gold light, his horned helmet and his armor disappear. Without them, he looks suddenly, terribly vulnerable.

"I've failed you," he says to Sigyn, swift and low. "I underestimated the strength of the Midgardians, but you underestimate me. My strength. We can begin again." He lets his hands fall, and he opens his eyes. He looks around, startled, as if he expected to be someplace else other than the rooftop.

"Take him," says Steve.

Tony steps forward, raising his palm-cannons again.

"Natasha," he says into his headset.

Sigyn steps into his path. "Wait. Please."

"Tony?" Natasha's voice is tight with tension. "What's going on?"

"Bring in the quinjet. We've got Loki."

"On my way," Natasha says.

Sigyn spins to face Loki again. "I am not this person you believe me to be. I am Sigyn. You gave me your promise, and I gave you mine."

"Take any other shape." The agony on Loki's face is as raw as his fear. "Any other shape but this one. I beg of you."

"I have not your magic," Sigyn says. "I cannot."

Loki crumples to his knees. Just like that, he's down. It's over. He doesn't even react as Tony, Steve and the Hulk move in and surround him. Sigyn kneels beside Loki, wrapping her arms around him. He shudders at her touch.

***

On behalf of all Midgardians, Tony is deeply offended that Sigyn doesn't blame SHIELD for Loki's meltdown. It never seems to cross her mind. Sure, it's probably true that Midgardian science is not up to the task of breaking a god's brain, but it would've been nice to be suspected, at least.

Tony steps into the elevator, and hits the button for Lower Level Five. It's funny, except not in a funny way: everyone on the team is free to go home. The mission's done. Loki is incarcerated. Stark Tower is ready and waiting in New York City, for anybody whose home is in another realm, or... anybody, really. Plenty of room. Yet the entire team is still lurking around the SHIELD bunker in South Dakota. Sleeping in cramped quarters. Eating mess hall food. Seven little realms, coiled in the branches of a black tree.

Tony can understand Thor and Sigyn wanting to stay. He's less clear about his own reasons.

The elevator dings and the heavy door slides open, and Thor strides in. Tony takes a big step backward to avoid getting bowled over. Thor halts abruptly as he realizes the elevator isn't empty. His face is grim, and his eyes are red-rimmed.

Tony puts a hand on his arm. "Hey. Thor. How are you holding up?"

It's the only thing he can think of to say, and it's by far the stupidest. Tony hated it when people asked him questions like that after his parents were killed, after Obie betrayed him. _How the fuck do you think I'm holding up?_

But, Thor says, "My thanks, Tony. Your concern is most welcome."

The doors slide shut, and the elevator remains motionless, waiting for the next button-push.

"We'll figure this out," Tony tells him. "We'll fix it. And your brother — he'll go right back to being a pain in everybody's ass."

A brief smile flickers on Thor's face.

"I'm sure you can talk Fury in to letting Loki go back to Asgard."

"No," Thor says quickly. "If Loki prevails against his madness, I shall take him to some far-off realm. I will stay with him, and Sigyn may stay too, if she wishes. I will make certain my brother never troubles Midgard again, but he cannot return to Asgard. When he escaped imprisonment, my father's rage shook the palace to its foundation."

"And if you take him back, he'll be punished even worse."

"Loki will be locked away in the deepest cavern at the base of Yggdrasil. My father swore it would be so."

Tony raises his eyebrows. "How exactly is that worse than Lower Level Five?"

"Far worse," Thor replies. "The compassion of you Midgardians toward my brother astounds me. I am more grateful than I can say."

Human history is rife with examples of how ugly humans can be toward one another, but there's no point in Tony saying this to Thor. Instead, he says,

"Awkward question... when we took Loki into custody, he seemed terrified of Sigyn."

Thor's brows draw together. "Director Fury told me of it during the unbriefing."

" _De_ briefing," Tony corrects him with a laugh. "And what did you say to Fury?"

"I told him I had no idea why this should be so."

"But, just between you, me and the security cameras — anything we ought to know about your brother's girlfriend?"

Thor shakes his head emphatically. "Sigyn is no warrior. No mighty sorceress. No plotter of intrigues nor poisoner of minds. She loves Loki. She would never hurt him."

Tony tilts his head. "You're certain of that."

Thor smiles again, a real Thor smile this time, like the sun breaking through clouds. "I tried to court Sigyn once. She refused me and chose Loki, though I am the richer prize by far."

"Thor said modestly," says Tony.

"I am the crown prince," Thor replies, and then he continues, with an undercurrent of sarcasm, "Unequalled in battle. Ever cheerful. Beloved of all." He glances away from Tony, lifting one hand in a shrug. "Loki is..."

"Not," Tony finishes.

"If you are looking to lay blame, then you must lay it upon me."

"Nobody blames you for your little brother being jealous, okay?"

"It is not, as you say, okay. I was the one who asked Sigyn to forgive Loki. When my brother was brought back to Asgard, I begged Sigyn to speak with him, to bring him comfort. She refused. Even having believed her betrothed dead for more than a year, she refused."

Thor folds his arms over his chest, and looks down at his boots, his sun-streaked hair falling across his eyes.

Tony says, "And if Loki had seen Sigyn in Asgard, he would've believed she was the real Sigyn."

Thor nods.

"Maybe," Tony tells Thor gently. "You weren't there when we sprang Sigyn on Loki. I'm pretty sure he would've reacted exactly the same. You can't blame yourself for this one, Thor."

"We were all so certain," Thor murmurs. "So sure the only danger in our plan was the danger to Sigyn."

Tony can't tell Thor about the sick feeling. He already spoke up a dozen different times during the briefings before the mission. So had Natasha. _This feels wrong. This feels bad. I don't like this._ Nobody had understood, except for the two of them.

Tony reaches over to hit the elevator's Door Open button.

"I'm sorry," he says again.

***

When the team first arrived at the SHIELD bunker deep in the Black Hills, Tony insisted on being given the grand tour. Nobody wanted to come with him except Natasha, because she's Natasha. Neither one of them liked the idea of sleeping above five levels of Could Be Anything.

"There could be cake down there," Tony said.

"There's no cake," Fury said.

"There's cake on Tuesdays," Natasha pointed out.

"Ah-hah," Tony said. "Top secret cake supply."

Natasha said, "It could be an alien hive. There was a hive under a casino, in an episode of _Battlestar Galactica_."

"I love you," Tony said. "Sincerely. I do, Natasha. Are you open to a polygamous relationship? Because I also love Pepper."

"That depends. Can we add Daniel Henney?"

"I'll have my people call his people."

Lower Level One through Lower Level Four are storage. There might be a secret cake supply and there might possibly be an alien hive. There are rooms full of shelves, all of them stacked high with crates and plastic tubs and banker's boxes. It's like the ending of _Raiders of the Lost Ark_.

Lower Level Five has one cell, at the end of a short corridor. According to the bunker's intranet, which Tony hacked into at the first opportunity, the bunker was built in 1973, so the cell wasn't built with Loki in mind.

It's Natasha who suggests that the bunker's failsafe must be a mechanism that collapses the floors on Lower Levels One through Four, crushing the occupant of Lower Level Five under thousands of reams of paper. That's probably not true, but it should be. It's fucking genius.

From the elevator, there's an unobstructed view down the hallway to the cell. The entire front-facing wall of the cell is two sheets of bulletproof Plexiglas, with offset holes to allow air to circulate. The overhead lights glow dimly to simulate night.

Tony says hey to the guards, and the guards nod back. He walks down the corridor, his sneakers whispering on the concrete floor.

It's not bad as prison cells go. It's better than the Hulk cage on the Helicarrier. There's a cot with a thin mattress, a blanket and a pillow. There's a toilet in the corner, behind a partition. The featureless walls are painted robin's-egg blue. An untouched tray of food sits on the floor near the cell door, but it's mess hall meatloaf. Tony won't eat that, either.

Loki is curled into the corner between the foot of the cot and the wall, his head down and his arms wrapped around his knees, as if he's making the smallest shape he possibly can. He's been like that ever since the team brought him in. Three days ago.

Tony puts his hands in his pockets. There's nothing much to look at, but he watches Loki anyway.

The elevator doors rumble open. Tony turns, expecting to see Thor again, but it's Clint. Clint hesitates when his eyes meet Tony's, but whatever he reads in Tony's face reassures him. He walks down the corridor to join Tony. They stand in silence for several minutes.

Finally, Clint says, "I thought this would be a lot more satisfying."

"Yeah. This rates pretty high on the suck-o-meter."

Clint snorts.

Tony asks him, "Did he ever say anything to you, back when you were henchmanning?"

"No. Well, he talked a lot about world domination."

"Naturally."

"He never seemed all that happy about it."

"Loki doesn't strike me as a happy guy."

"That's the thing, though." Clint turns to Tony, his brow furrowing. "When he'd talk to Selvig about the Tesseract, he was completely different. He and Selvig were like you and Banner when you two really get going. He _smiled._ And not in that, 'I'm gonna make a throw rug out of your skin' way."

Tony considers that, while he considers Loki. Loki doesn't give any sign he's listening to their conversation. His back moves slightly with his breathing, but other than that, he is so still, he could be a piece of room décor.

Thor's little brother has been a pain in the Avengers' collective ass for nearly a year. Sometimes he'll throw in with Dr. Doom or The Mandarin. Sometimes he'll pop up solo like he did this time, ignite chaos and destruction, then scurry away. Nobody can figure out where. Not even his erstwhile allies, who are always extremely pissed off about that when they get captured.

Loki is charismatic and scary-powerful. Even without a mind-controlling scepter, he could easily unite an army under his command — an army the Avengers might not be able to beat. He hasn't done it. Unless he's playing a long and complicated game that involves double-crossing every supervillain in the world, Tony guesses he's not going to do it. Like Clint says, Loki doesn't seem all that happy about world domination.

Loki's arms are curled up over his head like he's waiting for a blow to fall. Looking at him makes Tony queasy. Not in his stomach, but in his soul. He's frequently fantasized about holding Loki down and punching him in the face repeatedly, but whatever actually happened to Loki after he took a dive off the Bifrost... that is not a fate Tony would ever wish on anyone.

He says, "Hypothetical scenario."

"Okay," Clint says warily.

"What if he was sorry?"

"He's not sorry," Clint says. "He's got PTSD."

"I'm talking about the future. What if he sincerely regrets what he's done? How would you feel about that?"

"I don't know," Clint replies.

It's a lot better than _fuck that shit,_ which is what Tony expected.

He says, "Loki can't go back to Asgard. Thor told me Odin's sworn to throw him into a cave under Yggdrasil for the rest of eternity."

"You're saying the worse he's punished, the angrier he'll get."

"I used to break things, just to get my parents' attention. Getting yelled at was better than being ignored."

"You're nothing like Loki."

"Oh no? I haven't run the numbers on our respective death tolls. I'm scared I'll come out ahead."

"That was Stark Industries, not you."

 _"L'etat, c'est moi,"_ Tony replies.

Clint grunts, and turns away.

***

On Tuesday, Sigyn asks Thor if there are harps on Midgard.

Thor perks up immediately. "I know not. Will you play for Loki?"

"I hadn't thought to bring my own harp from Asgard," Sigyn replies. "But now my hours hang heavy upon me. Perhaps Loki will take some pleasure in my playing."

"He always does," Thor tells her warmly.

"We have harps," Natasha says.

Tony slaps his hand down on the table. "Lady Sigyn, I'll get you a harp. The best harp on Midgard. I will have it air-freighted from Europe, if I have to."

Sigyn's face brightens for the first time in days, and it brightens even more when Steve returns to the table with a tray full of chocolate cake slices.

"What are we talking about?" Steve asks as he sits down.

"Music soothing the savage beast," Tony tells him.

"Breast," Steve says.

"Huh?"

"'Music has charms to soothe the savage _breast,_ ' not beast. It's a line from a play by William Congreve."

"Wait a second. You mean not only have I've been saying that quote wrong for years, I've been saying it the _less dirty_ way?"

Steve laughs and reaches for the last slice of cake on the tray. Tony postpones his own cake, pulls out his custom-built Starkphone, and starts Googling harps.

By Tuesday evening, he and Bruce are harp experts. By midnight, they're arguing over which harp to buy for Sigyn. Tony wants the 18th century Jean-Henri Naderman harp up for auction at Paris Druout. Bruce wants the Lyon & Healy 85 CG, which is several tens of thousand dollars cheaper, and just as good an instrument as the Naderman. So Bruce claims.

"Mine has a mermaid on it," Tony tells Sigyn.

Pepper took Sigyn shopping in Rapid City yesterday, in an effort to cheer her up. Sigyn has since abandoned her fluttery Asgardian gown in favor of blue jeans and a dark green sweater. Loki's broken necklace gleams against her tawny skin. She's obviously not comfortable yet with the concept of wearing jeans and a sweater instead of a gown, but they're a lot more practical inside the chilly bunker.

"I know not what a mermaid might be," Sigyn tells Tony patiently. "So, I doubt it will affect the quality of my playing."

Tony presses a detail photo into her hand, tracing his finger down the mermaid carving on the harp's graceful pillar. "You see? Right here. Look how awesome that is."

"Oh, a Rhine maiden," Sigyn says. "Yes, that's very pretty."

Bruce says, "The Lyon & Healy was built in January. Of this year. In this millennium."

"Exactly," says Tony. "It's got no gravitas."

"It probably also doesn't have termites."

"Jean-Henri Naderman was the royal luthier to Marie-Antoinette."

"Did you even know what a luthier was, before yesterday?"

"What is your point?" Tony says irritably.

Bruce sighs and flops back in his chair. He pulls off his glasses to polish them on the tail of his button-down shirt.

Sigyn hands the glossy print-outs back to Tony. "I'm going down to Lower Level Five, to watch over Loki for a little while," she says. "Neither harp is my harp, so either harp will please me. As does your generosity."

"Fat lot of help you are," Tony says.

Tony wins the harp argument because he's the guy with all the money. He buys the Jean-Henri Naderman harp, and then shoots Happy an e-mail, telling him to take the jet to Paris first thing in the morning, and pick up the harp from the auction house.

Bruce says, "I don't know why you want to waste all that money. The Lyon & Healy is just as good."

"Not for a goddess," Tony replies.

He heads down to Lower Level Five about an hour later. Sigyn is still there. She's not directly in front of Loki's cell; instead she's standing about halfway down the corridor between the cell and the elevator doors. Loki hasn't budged from his crouch in the corner.

"How long can he go without sleeping or eating?" Tony asks her. Because he's pretty sure Loki isn't catnapping on the sly. Not if he still thinks he's being mindfucked by the Chitauri.

"A long while," Sigyn answers gravely. "Always before, Loki came to me to calm his heart. Now I frighten him."

"Has he said anything to you?"

She shakes her head. "No. And when I speak to him, he covers his ears."

Tony sucks in a long breath between his teeth.

"I never should have left him."

"Except, he's the one who broke it off. Isn't he?"

She looks at Tony sharply, and Tony laughs.

"You scare him now, and you scared him then, Sigyn."

"He told me I bored him."

"Ouch," Tony says.

Sigyn sighs.

"But you know..." he says, "Just because he said it, doesn't mean he meant it."

"It's true, though. I'm no equal to Loki's mind."

Tony shrugs. "That doesn't make you worthless or boring. Guys like Loki tell a lot of lies, and mostly to themselves."

Her mouth curves in sarcastic amusement. "And how would you know such a thing, Tony Stark?"

"Because I _am_ a guy like Loki."

Sigyn's expression softens, and before she can say anything else, Tony adds quickly,

"I bought you the harp with the Rhine maiden. Maybe that will help."

She smiles sadly. "Perhaps it will."

***

The harp arrives Friday morning in a gigantic padded shipping carton. There's no point in packing and unpacking the thing twice, so they take it right down to Lower Level Five and unpack it there. Everybody comes along. Well, not Fury and not Hill. And Pepper has to teleconference with Hong Kong. But, everybody else.

They litter the hallway in cardboard, packing peanuts, rolls of foam and quilted cloth until, at long last, the harp stands revealed. It looked gorgeous in the jpegs on the Paris Druout web site, but in person, it's breathtaking. It glows with varnish. The sheen is so deep, the wood almost seems translucent, like amber. The filmy ribbons and scrolls of gold paint are nearly rubbed away by time, but the mermaid's scales glint with inlaid mother-of pearl. The little keys to wind the strings are ivory. Each one has a different, tiny flower painted on it.

Thor and Sigyn gape at the harp, then they turn to each other, and burst out laughing.

"Oh, come on!" Tony protests.

Bruce catches his eye, and gives him a sympathetic wince.

"What -- what foolishness is this?" Thor exclaims, unsuccessfully struggling to get his laughter under control.

"I'm sorry it's not up to _Asgardian_ standards," Tony tells him. "It's the best I could do on short notice."

It's the best Midgard can do, in fact.

Sigyn flaps a hand at the harp. "It is enormous! This is a harp fit for a giantess!"

Tony widens his eyes in mock innocence. "But... but I thought women loved big instruments."

Thor bends double, hugging himself around the middle and laughing helplessly.

Tony has to admit that even though an 18th century Jean-Henri Naderman harp didn't wow Sigyn the way he expected, it's still worth all his money and trouble to see Thor laugh like that. And Thor's mirth is contagious. Tony can't help but smile at The Mighty Thor, stricken by a giggle fit; Steve, Bruce and Clint are all cracking up now, and even Natasha is grinning.

"Tony Stark." Sigyn frowns, but he can tell she's fighting valiantly not to smile. "Your jests are not appropriate for the company of ladies."

"Stop walking right into them, then."

Sigyn gives up, and laughs. "Very well. I concede you the victory." Then she touches Tony's arm. "Thank you for your gift. Truly."

"Sure," Tony says, uncomfortable as always with being thanked. "I take it that in Asgard, harps are... less impressive?"

"I rest mine on my knee when I play," she says, and then she gives him a quelling look worthy of Pepper.

Tony really wants to make another joke anyway — but he's worried he might break Thor, who is pink-cheeked and gasping. Instead, he walks over to the harp, kicking aside drifts of bubble wrap. Sigyn moves around to the other side. The harp is taller than she is.

"With a Midgardian harp," Tony says, "you sit on a chair. And you reach across the strings."

"I see."

She trails her hands over the silky wood, touching the flowers, the mermaid's hair, the little bird carved into one corner. Tentatively, she reaches out, her fingers hovering for a moment. She chooses a string, and then she plucks it.

Tony expects the harp to be out of tune from traveling across the ocean and halfway across the country, but the note is round and golden.

"Oh," Sigyn says. The rapture in her voice is nearly sexual. _"Oh."_

She chooses another string, pinging a sweet, high note from it. The third string is sour. She frowns and gives the little ivory key a tweak, fiddling with it until the string is in tune. Then she runs her fingers down all the strings. There are a few off-key plonks in the brilliant glissade of notes, but not many.

"It is magnificent," she says. "I have never beheld its equal."

"I'm glad you like it."

"He's looking at us," Natasha says.

Tony's eyes flick past Sigyn. Loki has lifted his head. His blue eyes are sunken in bruised sockets, and his mouth is taut. His cheekbones strain at his skin. When Sigyn turns to face him, he flinches.

She halts, not moving a muscle. Loki rises slowly to his feet, his hands braced against the wall behind him. He takes a step toward the front the cell, and Thor draws in a soft, sharp breath. Loki tentatively approaches the Plexiglas wall, his focus shifting to Thor. Then Loki looks at the harp. At the mess of packing material scattered on the floor. At the rest of the team, tense with anticipation. He frowns.

If he flips out and shreds the Plexi like Saran wrap, better that they're all here to take him down. Tony touches the metal band on his wrist. There's no JARVIS here in the bunker. He'll have to use his cell phone to call the Iron Man suit, and the reception down here isn't great.

Loki's gaze returns to Sigyn. He lifts one hand, rests it on the Plexiglas. When Sigyn moves forward, Loki tenses, but he holds his ground. She walks up to the cell, and lays her hand in the same place as Loki's, on her side of the Plexiglas.

***

"That is the most romantic thing I've ever seen," says Pepper.

"I'll copy the file to a flash drive," Tony says, "if you want to be alone with it."

Pepper rolls her eyes at him, and leans back in the swivel chair at his desk. Tony reaches over her shoulder to tap the Space bar on his laptop, pausing the security footage. Loki and Sigyn freeze on either side of the Plexiglas, their hands separated by less than six inches.

Pepper sits forward in the chair again. "Hey, I want to see the rest."

"Nothing else happens. This when they start talking in Asgardian."

Pepper taps the Space bar anyway. Loki and Sigyn remain where they are. Sigyn speaks to Loki, and Loki leans his forehead against the Plexiglas.

Of course, Fury wanted to know what was being discussed. Thor just shrugged. _Lovers' talk_ , he'd said. _Nothing of concern to SHIELD_. None of the translator algorithms can parse Asgardian, but Fury's still trying.

Pepper turns up the speaker volume, catching Sigyn in the middle of a sentence that spills over Tony like the golden notes of the harp. Loki responds, his voice low and rough with exhaustion. There's something elementally thrilling about listening to the language of gods. It's obvious to Tony what Loki and Sigyn are saying to one another, even if he can't understand the words.

Then something happens that Tony missed when he was standing there watching the two of them. The security camera has a much higher angle on the scene than he did. Sigyn murmurs to Loki, and Loki smiles. Barely a twitch of his mouth, but it's not the supervillain sneer Tony's used to seeing. It's a real smile. And Tony gets it now. He understands why Loki loves her.

Out of the corner of his eye, Tony sees Pepper's head begin to dip sideways.

"Do not say aww," he warns her.

"I wasn't going to say aww."

Tony pins her with an accusing look.

She huffs. "Come on. After all this, don't you almost... not want to rip Loki's arms out of their sockets?"

"Almost," Tony admits.

He splits the screen and pulls up a live feed on the left-hand side, stepping back to watch from beside Pepper's chair. Loki is asleep, his long body sprawled on the cot, one arm dangling off the edge. Sigyn isn't with him; she's probably still asleep out in her own quarters. Thor stands watch in her place.

Pepper gets out of the chair, and slides her arms around Tony's waist. Tony hugs her close, resting his chin on the top of her head. Her hair smells like peaches.

"I love you," he says.

"I love you, too. And that was a wonderful thing you did for Loki."

"I didn't actually _do_ anything," Tony says.

All the same, he's got a hypothesis. The hallway awash in bubble wrap and packing peanuts. Sigyn wearing a sweater and jeans, while tuning up a giantess-sized harp. Thor laughing hard enough to hurt himself at Tony's dumb double-entendre. No alien brainwashing mastermind would concoct a scenario like that. It's absurd. Therefore, it must be real. Therefore, Sigyn must be real. Therefore, despite what Loki said on the rooftop about Sigyn never coming back to him, she's come back to him.

Tony's forced to agree with Pepper: it's romantic.

"That was a wonderful thing you didn't do on purpose," Pepper says.

"Definitely one of my better accidents."

The black feeling inside Tony's head, the bad, sick feeling... it's gone. He's not sure when it fucked off, but it's not there anymore, and that's all he cares about. On the security monitor, Loki shifts in his sleep, turning onto his side so he's facing Thor.

"Aww..." Pepper says.

Tony doesn't disagree.

***


End file.
